THE MAGIC CIRCUS.
TEDDY was still in bed, though the doctor had said that very soon he might have the big chair wheeled up to the window and sit there awhile.
Now he was propped up against the pillows playing with the paper circus his mother had brought to him the day before.
His little cousin Harriett had come in yesterday to spend the afternoon with him, and together they had cut out the figures--the clown, the ring-master, the pretty lady on the white horse, the acrobat on his coal-black steed, and all the rest.
This morning he had put some large books under the bedquilt, and smoothed it over them so as to make a flat plane, and was amusing himself setting the circus out, and arranging his soldiers in a long procession as if they were the audience coming to see it.
He seemed so well entertained that his mother said she would go over to the sewing-room for a little while to run up some seams on the machine.
When Teddy was left alone he still went on playing very happily, but as he set out the soldiers two by two, he was really thinking of the Counterpane Fairy and her wonderful stories.
The evening before he had fallen asleep while his mother was reading something to his father (for they both sat in Teddy's room in the evenings now that he was ill), and when he woke they were talking together about him.They did not see that his eyes were open, so they went on with what they were saying.It was his mother who was speaking.
"He's such an odd child," she was saying; "just now he is full of this idea of the Counterpane Fairy and her stories, and he talks of her just as though she were real.I don't know where he got the idea.It isn't in any of his book and I thought you must have been telling him about it.""No," said papa, "I didn't tell him.""Perhaps it was Harriett," said mamma, and then she saw that he was awake and began to speak of something else.
Teddy wished his mother could see the Counterpane Fairy herself, and then she would know that it was a real fairy and not a make-believe.
When he saw the Counterpane Fairy again he was going to ask her if he mightn't take his mother into one of the stories with him.
He was thinking of her so hard that it did not surprise him at all to hear her little thin voice just back of the counterpane hill."Oh dear, dear! and the worst of it is that I hardly get to the top before I have to come down again.""Is that you, Counterpane Fairy?" called Teddy.
"Yes it is," said the fairy."I'll be there in a minute"; and soon she appeared above the top of the hill, and seated herself on it to rest, and catch her breath."Dear, dear!" she said, "but it's a steep hill.""Mrs.Fairy," said Teddy, "I want to ask you something.You know my mother?""Yes," said the Counterpane Fairy, "I know who she is.""Well," said Teddy, "she's just gone over into the sewing-room, and Iwant to know whether you won't let me take her into a square sometime.""My mercy, no!" said the fairy."Have you forgotten what I told you the first time I came?""What was that?""I told you I went to see little boys and girls.I don't go to see grown people.They wouldn't believe in me.""My mother would," said Teddy."She plays with me and she likes my books and I tell her all about you.""No, no!" cried the Counterpane Fairy, "I couldn't think of it.I'm very glad to take you into my stories, but if you don't care to go by yourself--" and she picked up her staff and rose as though she were going.
"Oh, I do, I do!" cried Teddy."Please don't go away.""Well, I won't," said the fairy, sitting down again, "if you really want me to show you another.Have you chosen a square?""No, I haven't yet," said Teddy.He looked the squares over very carefully, and at last he chose the black-and-white one where the circus was standing.
"Very good," said the fairy."Now I'm going to begin to count." Teddy fixed his eyes on the square and she commenced.
Gradually he began to feel as though the white silk of the square was a pale cloudy sky.Before him stretched a white streak, and in the distance were some things like black squares; he did not know quite what.
"FORTY-NINE!" cried the fairy.
When Teddy looked about him he and the Counterpane Fairy were journeying along a dusty white road together, and the fairy looked just as any little old woman might, except that her eyes were so bright behind her spectacles.
Before them lay a city with black roofs and spires; there was a sound of drums and music in the distance, and a faint noise as though a crowd of people were shouting a great way off.
"What are they doing over there?" asked Teddy, hurrying his steps a little."Is it a parade?""No," said the fairy, "it's not a parade, but it is a grand merrymaking, and it's because of it that I've brought you here.But I'm tired and hungry, for we've come a long way, so let us sit down by the roadside a bit, and while we rest I'll tell you all about the goings on and what we have to do with them."Teddy was quite willing, so he and the Counterpane Fairy sat down together on the soft grass beside the road, with the mild and misty sky overhead, and the fairy took from her pocket a piece of bread and cheese; she broke it in half and one part she gave to Teddy.It seemed to him that he had never tasted anything so good, for, as the fairy remarked, they were both of them hungry.
After they had finished it all to the very last bit, the fairy brushed the crumbs from her lap, and, sitting there with the soft wind blowing about them and the black roofs of the city in the distance, the Counterpane Fairy told him the story of the King of the Black-Country and the Princess Aureline.
"Far off yonder toward the east, where the sky looks so pale and bright," began the fairy, "there lives a king, who is called King Whitebeard, because his beard is as white as snow.He had only one child, a daughter named the Princess Aureline, and she was as beautiful as the day and as good as she was beautiful.
"Because she was so good and beautiful princes used to come from all over the world seeking her hand in marriage, and among them came the King of the Black-Country, the richest and most powerful of them all.
